


breaking open

by starsonyourskin



Category: The Fall (TV 2013)
Genre: F/F, Femslash, Fluff and Angst, Mild Smut, Relationship(s), Slash, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-14
Updated: 2017-02-17
Packaged: 2018-09-08 14:07:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 29
Words: 18,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8848000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starsonyourskin/pseuds/starsonyourskin
Summary: Stella and Reed have some unfinished business in Belfast. But can Stella stop doubling and allow herself to open up?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Set after season 3. An indulgent series mostly about Stella/Reed. Would really appreciate it if someone could beta the next chapter.

“Where did you go?” Stella asked Reed, setting down her travel bags at the foot of her desk. She kind of knew, of course. She had casually tried to get PC Ferrington to tell her where Reed had gone after they’d apprehended Spector. Nobody knew very much, only that Reed had quit her job and left Belfast. It turned out that Reed, like Stella, was a woman who valued her privacy.

“I moved. After the divorce. Moved back to Croydon, it seemed easier to get a little help with child care.” Reed said, almost apologetically, looking more at her feet than Stella’s face.

“Oh.” Stella said, trying to stop a disappointment flash across her eyes. She turned her body away from Reed, facing the window. So Reed had been living in London for a couple of months while she’d been there too, but Reed hadn’t called. Croydon, and everything that it had taught Reed, was harder to get away from for her than Stella had assumed.

“I hope you’re settling in,” Stella said, keeping her tone neutral.

“I am, thank you. It’s nice to be back home again. And the divorce was… well, it was just time. So it was quite amicable. He promises to visit during the school holidays when he can.”

Reed is oversharing, out of guilt, Stella noticed. “Good. I’m sure you’ll be invaluable to us during the interviews.”

After all, that is what they are here for. There won’t be a trial for Spector, because he took the cowardly way out, but there are many internal loose threads that need to be tied together. The former team had all contributed to a report for the Performance Committee, which investigated if there had been any breaches of the code of ethics. The team needed to be interviewed, and that would be used as evidence to come to a decision.

Reed takes Stella’s frosty politeness as her cue to leave, and turned around. She’s never this formal with her.

Stella can’t help herself. If Reed divorced, then maybe all she needs is a little nudge.

“Tanya.” Stella paused, seeking the right words. She turned around to face her, and Reed’s understated beauty still sent a little thrill up her spine. “If you’re not living here anymore, are you staying at a hotel?”

Reed can’t help but let a little smile curl the corners of her mouth. So she’s still interested, then, Reed thought. Why else would she be interested in knowing if she can pop round quickly?

“No, we haven’t sold the house yet. My ex-husband is staying with one of our friends from uni. So I’m there. While I’m here I need to put everything in boxes and send some of it to London. Why do you ask?”

“No reason, just curious,” Stella said.

Perhaps more than a little curious, Reed thought.

As soon as Reed had left the room, Stella fought the impulse to cover her face with her hands. This woman never ceased to make her feel like a teenager with a crush. She wondered too about the motorbike. Had she sold it yet? Shipped it across? Riding in London seemed almost comical, with the city’s many lights and heavy traffic. She let herself indulge in these thoughts for a couple of minutes, and then started rereading her notes with a sigh.


	2. Chapter 2

I’m no longer in Croydon, Reed thought. Not physically, nor mentally. She was lying in her bed in her old house that felt much too big and lonely for her without the clatter and activity of the girls. 

And going back, that had felt differently too. As much as her mother and aunts tried to patronise her with their opinions of her lack of feminine virtue of choice, they no longer hit that raw, vulnerable part of her that used to make her shrink back in shame.  They hadn’t changed, she had. She could let go of the image of the girl that was so ashamed of herself that she let her shoulders hunch and couldn’t work up the courage to get past her shyness and get a word in in any conversation that wasn’t with her best friend. She had outgrown her shyness. People could see her now, for who she really was, and reach through the plate of glass that she’d erected between her and other people to make the hurt sting less. 

Work came easily to her. Once she’d decided that working with live people wasn’t up her alley, everything else had clicked into place. She rarely doubted herself, or hesitated to offer her advice and expertise when needed. But that felt impersonal, like she was putting on a costume of professional Reed to deal with the stresses of the job. Personal Reed, who kissed cuts and wiped noses, as she had put it to Stella that night in the mortuary corridor, would have to come out with Stella if she wanted Stella to do the same. 

Stella could do it like no other - reach her. She’d been taken aback by herself when she’d remarked that Stella’s nails weren’t sharp, but she hadn’t been embarrassed. And it had encouraged Stella to kiss her on the lips that night in Bert’s bar. In fact, she wished she’d kissed her some more that night. Not going up with her was the right thing to do at the time, because she couldn’t stand to wound poor Michael more than she already had. But divorcing him was the truest thing she’d ever done. True to herself, and who she really was inside. Quietly, in the dark, Tanya made a decision. 

_____

 

The next day was headache-inducing, for the both of them. They were summoned, one by one, to go into the interview room and answer questions relating to the case by the Professional Standards Department’s Performance Committee. 

The lowest-ranking officers went in first, presumably to counter any spin that the senior officers might want to put on their own performance. This meant that Stella and Reed were left hanging around the office for most of the day, along with Burns and Eastwood. 

Stella was too distracted by Reed to pay them much notice, while Burns whizzed around them to show that he was a Very Busy and Important Man. Now that Reed was single, Stella allowed herself to feel everything inside that she’d withheld the previous year. 

Reed handed her a styrofoam cup of tea. The ceramic ones were off limits to them now, as visitors.  She glanced around the bullpen to make sure they were out of Burn’s earshot. She shifted the centre of her weight a little closer to Stella. God, her eyes, she thought.

“If you’re free, I could use some help packing those boxes,” Reed said

She could see a spark of surprise and curiosity light up in those blue eyes. Stella mimicked her body posture and leaned into Reed.

“Tonight?” Stella demurred. “We might be here for a very long time, these things always overrun.” Why didn’t you just say yes? Stella thought to herself. Reed will have you do whatever she wants you to do, and you won’t be able to say no.

“Only if you’re free. If we’re free. I might even let you get off without packing any boxes.” Reed gulped her tea without breaking eye contact with Stella. Reed swore she could see her shiver at the implication. 

Burns swanned in. “It shouldn’t be too long, I think. We’re moving up the ranks quite steadily. It is a large team of course, with so many murders. I’ve got a few gubbins to finish off here and there so will you warn me when you go in Stella?”

For the second time that day, Stella affirmed, that yes, she would text him before she went in. As Burns disappeared in a flurry of phone calls, Stella turned around to Reed again, who was plucking an imaginary piece of fluff off her sleeve. The moment had gone. 


	3. Chapter 3

Stella threw the cup in the bin and excused herself to go to the toilet.  She looked at herself in the mirror and critically noted every line, every age spot, her changing jawline and nose, and then gathered those thoughts and threw them out. Reed, unlike Olson or Anderson, was not just interested in the image of herself that she projected.

Olson’s death had softened her, and she was surprised at the small well of feeling that arose when she learned of his assassination. But here’s the thing, she thought. Gibson doesn’t do relationships. That doubling, that she told Reed about, well, it only works up to a certain extent. Her colleagues who had spouses and kids, she sometimes looked at them like they were foreign beings. That was something, she thought, that marked her out as completely different. It was an easy explanation for her colleagues, too. There were two stereotypes for successful officers. The stereotype of the alcoholic divorcee only worked for men. Stella knew that she fully embodied the female one: the cold-hearted bitch who had to shut off part of her heart to function. It wasn’t the whole truth, or even part of the truth, but it worked as a mythology for many of her colleagues. For her to be fully integrated is not something that her colleagues would readily accept. It would undermine her authority, encourage disobedience of her orders, make the senior team look down on her. It was, for now, in 2012, out of the question.

But Reed, oh Reed, she thought. Olson had been easy. He’d been her little sex toy - he just came with a pulse attached. If it had been that easy with Olson, then surely she should be able to use her old tricks on Reed and take this scared little girl inside of her and tell her to go away, just like she did with her thoughts about aging. It might not be all Reed wants, but it could be a part of it. And what was she doing here anyway, soliloquising to herself about Reed without talking to her like a normal human being? She sighed and left to go see if there’d been any updates on the interviews. 

_____

 

Stella had sat in the interviews feeling a little outside of herself. Should she really be dealing with these lazy political attempts to find blame in the case when it was mostly just circumstance and ACC Burns being promoted to the point of incompetency? Should she be dealing with these sentence fragments that drifted in and out of her consciousness: 

“… relating to the nature of the complaints… the procedure governing the gathering, retention and use of… nonviolent methods before resorting to force...your professional judgement has been questioned...”

When there was Reed? Reed, who had left earlier than she had and might be at home now, in her soft clothes with a glass of wine, sorting her paperbacks, her hair down.

She drew a sharp breath and refocused her mind. Locate the passages in the Code of Ethics and argue the opposite, she thought. Then I’ll be out of here as quickly as possible.

_____

 

Reed had contemplated her home clothes, but thought Stella might like her more if she wore her work stuff. There was no doubt in her mind that she’d be coming over. 

Her phone buzzed. It was Stella asking for her address.  She grabbed an extra wine glass.


	4. Chapter 4

Stella allowed herself a little fantasy as she made her way over to Reed’s. She was hoping that Reed’s invitation was not purely platonic. She let her mind’s eye roam over Reed’s blouse, always tight in the right places. What would it be like if she just let go a little bit tonight and let Stella fuck her? Stella imagined that after some takeaway and a glass of wine she would lean towards Reed and run her finger along her jawline towards her lips and they would naturally fall into a slow, but impassioned kiss. Not the haphazardly placed smack in the bar that had not only been for Reed but also to deter the arrogant solicitor. The second one had only had a hint of tongue and Stella wanted more. Then, after the kissing pushed the overflow of desire in both of their bodies to a breaking point, they would undress each other and go upstairs. Or they would start undressing while they were kissing and continue in the bedroom. The first touches would be electric and the heat in their centres would build and build and Reed would come minutes after Stella first started going down on her. Stella really wanted Reed to allow herself to feel desire and wanted it to be easy for her to orgasm. Stella was unsure if Reed had ever slept with a woman before, but she was knew she’d be a good student, and besides, Stella didn’t think she needed much encouragement. While Stella was imagining her ideal encounter, a whisper of erotic energy went through her body, and she pulled up to Reed’s house. 

It was a neat brick house in South Belfast, with a bay window and a round archway leading to the white frontdoor. It had narrowly escaped the prefab stone cladding by a street or two, and the only thing that made it identifiably Reed was the bike parked on the drive.   
_____

One of the decisions Reed made was that she would take things slowly, and not let Stella rush her, no matter how wound up she got. But she couldn’t help but think about Stella, and how attracted she was to her, and how she’d been a little cold today when she first arrived.

When the doorbell rang she was out of her seat like a shot. 

“Good evening, DSI Gibson,” Reed teased.

Stella made a sound like she was swallowing a nervous laugh. “Good evening, Professor Reed-Smith.”

“Just Reed, now,” Reed said. 

“Right, sorry.” 

“No need for an apology, I don’t think the deed poll has gone through yet,” Reed said.

Stella smirked, making that slightly apologetic face that Reed found so adorable.

After she’d taken off her coat, Reed’s eyes wandered to Stella’s body. Stella wore one of those criss-cross white blouses that she wore often, with an olive green pencil skirt that fitted perfectly. The blouse only showed a hint of neckline and billowed elegantly. Her hair was lightly curled mid-length and the only hint of colour she wore that night was a touch of plum on her lips. She looked regal.

“I made pasta. Tuna and olives.”

“Oh, that’s lovely, thanks,” Stella said, thinking to herself that she didn’t actually like tuna very much. 

“So, what’s it like, being back in Belfast again?” Reed asked Stella while they nestled on the couch with their bowls of pasta on their laps and glasses of red.

“I could ask you the same question. I had a bit of a deja vu moment, arriving at the airport, but then Burns wasn’t waiting there for me, which was a relief.” 

They both chuckled.

Stella continued: “The sense of threat is gone, now, with Spector dead. It had rattled me a little more than I’d admitted to myself.” She paused, studying Reed’s face to see if she could continue. “The thing that occupied me most fully before arriving was seeing you again.” She looked away momentarily, unused to this vulnerable feeling.

Reed paused, and set her half-finished bowl on the table. “Me too, actually. I feel like things between us were... unfinished.”

“Yes.” 

The silence between them became uncomfortable, with the both of them unclear on how to proceed.

“Are you not a big pasta fan?” Reed asked, gesturing to Stella’s nearly full bowl.

“Don’t like tuna very much actually.”

“You’re the only queer lady I’ve ever known to say that,” Reed joked, while filing away that little factoid in the back of her mind. Stella, no tuna.

Stella chortled. “Do you know many, then?”

“A couple. Dated a few at uni, and when Michael and I split up for six months after we’d graduated. You?”

“Oh, really? You seemed so startled when I kissed you.”

“Yes because that was completely unexpected!” Reed protested, and noticed that Stella wasn’t answering her question.

“Oh, come off it,” Stella said. “We’d been flirting all night - long looks, you brushed against my legs a couple of times.”

“Completely unintentional,” Reed disagreed. “I wasn’t even thinking about you like that until I saw you walk in.”

“You’ve just contradicted yourself!” Stella said, raising her voice. She touched the rim of her wine glass, circling it, looking pensive. “Well, I’d been thinking about you like that ever since I met you,” she said, suddenly vulnerable again, taking another sip.

“To be honest, I didn’t, not from the start. But it grew the longer I got to know you. You do realise half of the officers have a crush on you, don’t you? You’re a beautiful woman.”

Stella gave a half-smile. “They only know a version of me that they can project their fantasies on. But thank you.”

“Perhaps you’re more magnetic than you think.” Reed said. Stella shot her an appreciative look. “Have you ever been in a relationship with a woman, Stella?” Reed asked.

“No. But perhaps not for the reason you think. I don’t seek them out really - relationships that is. Any encounters I’ve had with women were just for the sheer fun of it.”

“Has anyone ever come close?” Reed asked softly.

“Perhaps. Stella put her wine glass down on the table. “But I don’t really want to talk about them now.”

“Hmm.” Reed was momentarily lost in thought. “Am I coming close?”


	5. Chapter 5

“Well, whether you are coming tonight is up to you,” Stella deflected.

Reed nearly spat out her wine at the crassness of the joke and the shift in tone. She looked over at Stella, who looked amused and had shifted closer to her. Stella took the wine glass out of Reed’s hands and put it on the floor. Stella kissed Reed slowly, languidly, softly. Her hands pushed Reed’s hair out of her face and rested at the back of her neck. 

Reed felt a flutter throughout her entire body. Stella’s hair tickled her collarbone and she smelt her floral perfume. Reed’s hands moved from her own lap to Stella’s shoulders, waist, hips. They found a gentle rhythm and Stella moved her weight so that she could straddle Reed’s lap. Suddenly Reed broke the kiss by moving her head and pushing Stella’s arms off of her. 

“As much as I want this, what I want even more is to get to know you a little bit,” Reed said. 

“Now, why would you want to do that?” Stella quipped. “I thought we were just getting started with our unfinished business.”

“Now that I’m in London, I thought we could extend our unfinished business a bit… I really like you Stella. More than a one-night-thing,” Reed confessed. 

“Reed…” Stella paused, thrown by Reed’s words. “I’m really intrigued by you, but I decided a couple of years ago that these things are… difficult for me. The job takes a lot out of me and I wouldn’t want you to ever feel as if you don’t come first place with your partner,” Stella admitted.

“Because your job comes first?” Reed asked, a little hurt. Had she read her wrong? “I mean, I’m not sitting around twiddling my thumbs either. I’ve got the girls, and I work nearly the same hours as you do.”

“Then why didn’t you call?” Stella asked sharply.

Ah, thought Reed. We’ve hit on the thing that’s been bothering her. “Because the divorce hasn’t even gone through yet. And I was settling back into an environment that brought up a lot of old… issues.”

“Croydon?”

“Yeah, Croydon. I was raised a certain way, and that way included being straight, but I think I’m ready to let that go. Because I’m not straight, and I wouldn’t want my girls to ever feel ashamed about themselves the way I did when I was growing up,” Reed said.

“Yeah. So you could see this continuing when we go back?” Stella asked, looking a bit uneasy.

“If you wanted it to.”

Stella sighed. “I don’t know, Tanya. I mean, I do, but it’s been years. I don’t want to make that decision quite yet. Can’t we just see how this evolves?” She looked younger, like she was shedding her authority and her containedness, but at the same time trying very hard to hold on to her innermost thoughts. 

“I suppose that that would be wise. Just seeing how you and I fit together without placing the weight of expectations on our relationship first.”

Stella didn’t answer. She continued to hold Reed’s gaze and placed her hand on Reed’s knee, a clear invitation for more touching.


	6. Chapter 6

Reed giggled. “You don’t know how to stop, don’t you? You’re beautiful, Stella Gibson, and if I didn’t have such a big fat crush on you I’d have told you to stop it right now since I’ve already told you I just wanted to talk. But I’ll allow it.” Stella’s presence overwhelmed her and made her feel like she was floating underwater and on a rollercoaster mid-free fall at the same time. On a cellular level she was dancing, all flight and flicker and flit and all she wanted was skin-on-skin connection, the drag of verbal communication dissolved.

Reed reached over and hovered in front of Stella’s face for a couple of seconds, drinking in every line of Stella’s face now that those icewater blues were closed. She was so world-weary and vivacious at the same time, and the haze of exhaustion that plagued her a couple of months ago had lifted. Reed slowly placed her lips on Stella’s and allowed herself to be led. What did it matter if she broke the expectations she’d had before Stella came over? Stella was here, now, ready for her, and there was nothing more intoxicating on this green earth.

_____

On some level, Stella couldn’t quite believe her luck. As much as Reed had occupied her thoughts during and after Belfast, her rejection in the bar made Stella believe that Reed would never be hers. Now she was finally where she was most comfortable, taking control, kissing the woman she was in love with.

Reed had her hands snaked around Stella’s waist and Stella believed that that is exactly where they were supposed to be right in this moment. There’s a lightness that shot up her spine over and over and over again and that spread to her throat, her shoulders, her stomach, even her calves. Reed smelled of soap and workday sweat and cherry shampoo. Stella traced Reed’s jawline and moved to her collarbone, final destination Reed’s top button. Reed moaned her assent. Stella undid every button before shrugging the blouse off Reed’s shoulders. Frustratingly, she was wearing a camisole underneath.

“We should go upstairs,” Reed says, knocking over an empty wine glass while she got up. They tiptoed around it and held hands as they walked. When Reed went up the stairs first Stella couldn’t help but stroke Reed’s ass as it bobbed up before her.


	7. Chapter 7

“Not. yet,” Reed said. “Patience.”

She took off her camisole herself, lavender pulled off brown skin. Stella’s gaze travelled appreciatively over Reed’s body. She liked Reed instructing her, but wanted to regain the upper hand. She dropped to her knees to undo Reed’s black jeans and pulled them over Reed’s thighs and let Reed step out of them. She then stood back up and allowed her hands roam with her as she met Reed’s lips. Reed moved to undo Stella’s blouse buttons but Stella playfully swatted her hand away. 

“Not yet,” Stella said, teasing Reed by echoing her earlier words. Reed smiled faintly, looking at Stella searchingly. Stella gave a soft push against Reed’s shoulders and let her fall on the bed. She kicked off her heels and crawled on it with her, kneeling next to her hips. She started the slow ascent of clambering up and down Reed’s curves with her fingertips, lips and tongue. Reed was awfully quiet, so Stella looked up to find the encouragement she was looking for. Reed moved her jaw in a come hither motion, to indicate that she’d like another kiss from Stella. She happily obliged and felt the world slow as their tongues played like waves on the shore. Stella moved her hand down to Reed’s knickers and Reed broke the kiss to unclasp her own bra. Stella straddled Reed and slid down, her hands finding Reed’s breasts and then the flimsy, damp material of her knickers again, running her index and middle finger down the length of the lace. Reed inhaled slowly and spread her legs a bit. With one hand, Stella slowly pulled down the knickers and threw them on the floor, leaving Reed completely exposed.

Reed was visibly wet and rolled her hips under Stella’s gaze, attempting to find some relief before Stella touched her. Stella started with her hands, spreading Reed to stop her cramping with this level of arousal, as Stella frequently did. She drew small circles up and down the crest in Reed’s folds before finally touching her clit. She looked up, and Reed was smiling at her, not quite the response she’d hoped for. She found a rhythm and added a finger for extra pressure. Reed seemed to quietly enjoy it, but wasn’t completely lost to the sensation. She changed hands and moved her right hand to enter Reed. Reed stopped her, slender fingers clenching around her wrist.

“I think I need a little more visual stimulation…” Reed whispered, half sitting up to finally undress Stella. 

Stella gratefully let her, her fingers too slick with Reed to do much. Now in underwear, Stella tried again. She held her own hair back before Reed took over from her and placed a tentative lick to test the waters. Reed leant back as much as she could and arched her back. As Stella continued, it became clear that this was as much as she was going to get out of Reed tonight. Stella had been with many different women who all liked different things, but the combination of her assertiveness, looks and sexual expertise usually produced… a bit more of a reaction. She continued while she processed this new situation. It didn’t bother her much with one night stands, how long they took, how frequently they came, as long as it was clear that they were both enjoying the encounter. But with Reed, she really cared.


	8. Chapter 8

She stopped and moved up to cuddle Reed.

“Are you enjoying this?” Stella asked, her authority returning in place of her confidence.

Reed rolled over to her side to face Stella. “I really am. But it usually takes me a while to really give into it. It’s different every time. Sometimes a little alcohol helps, but not too much, or a long bath, or a massage, or it depends on the type of relationship.”

Stella paused for a couple of seconds, taking this in, especially the last part. “Did we move too quickly?” Her self-doubt was making her feel guilty for ignoring Reed’s cues downstairs.

“No, no, not at all,” Reed soothed. “It just doesn’t happen every time, and that’s okay. It doesn’t mean I don’t want this, or that you need to wine and dine me beforehand.”

Stella still looked full of self-reproach.

Reed took Stella’s hand and said: “Let me show you how I do it.” She dragged Stella’s hand over the tops of her breasts, down to her belly button, her pubic bone, and used their fingers to rub in a steady rhythm. Reed closed her eyes and followed.

“Sometimes I think I’m in my head too much,” she murmured.

“What’s that?” Stella asked softly.

Reed’s eyes snapped open and she stopped moving her hand, and let Stella’s go. “For some people, they can just let everything wash over them and be really present with the person they’re with and just let their orgasm hit them. I feel like I need to go away to a place in my mind and just focus on the sensations to get there.”

“Mmm.” Stella said. “It can be hard for women to really own up to their desires without fear of reprisal.”

“No, it’s not that,” Reed responded. “Well, I suppose it’s partly that but it’s more about allowing myself to feel what’s already there, and then finding that tender balance of responding to you while still being in touch with what’s going on inside of me.“

“It does come with time, I find,” Stella said. “With the few relationships I’ve been in, I’ve found it gets easier the more you know that the other person is going to do everything they can for you to come. And once you know that the other person doesn’t mind if you get really selfish and greedy.” 

Reed smiled. “I like the sound of that.”

“Well, what if we both get selfish tonight?” Stella asked with a raised eyebrow. She moved Reed’s hand back to her clit and rolled over to move her own hand to hers. 

Reed took the hint and started masturbating. Stella stroked Reed’s calves with the side of her foot, and moved closer to Reed, shoulders touching, her hot breath in Reed’s ear. Stella had to pace herself to be in sync with Reed. She listened to Reed’s breathing to hear how far along she was. Stella fielded blissful waves and moaned softly when she reached the edge, temporarily slowing down to prevent going over too soon. 

She noticed that Reed responded when she moaned by sighing or breathing heavily, and let her head and hair drop onto Reed’s chest for increased contact. Reed moved her head back in apparent pleasure but took some time to return to heavier breathing. Stella had nearly reached the point of no return, where no amount of slowing down or removing her hand could decrease the upwards spiral that was coiling deep inside her belly. Reed moaned softly next to Stella. She was close, too. Out of instinct, Stella used her left hand to to touch Reed’s inner thigh. She heard Reed hold her breath and let go herself while they both disappeared into oblivion. 

“That was nice,” Reed was the first one to speak.

“Hmm. Very,” Stella agreed.

“And strangely intimate too. I don’t think I’ve done that with anyone before,” Reed whispered, thumbing over Stella’s cheek.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short one before I take a little Christmas break. Happy holidays, Stella/Reed shippers!

_ Would you like to see my new place? Finally moved the last boxes out of my aunties’ today.  _ Reed pressed send.

They’d met briefly, for coffee, about a week after they’d got back from Belfast. She’d obviously been pleased to see Reed, but something had been a little off. Reed thought Stella would thaw out when they’d go somewhere a bit more private, or nighttime. 

Her phone pinged.  _ Yes, I would like that. But can I take you somewhere beforehand? There’s a lovely German place that’s just opened. _

Reed smiled. Of course Stella Gibson would want to take her out somewhere expensive and candlelit. But her family had done so much childminding for her these past few weeks, she felt guilty about asking again.

Stella:  _ Sure. I could find someone else to take over for a night if you wanted to? _

No, Stella, Reed thought. I don’t want another childminder, I want you in my home with my children. As soon as she’d thought it, Reed admonished herself. She knew Stella wasn’t the domestic type. Surely she should stop harbouring any delusions that Stella would become a homebody with perfect childcare skills. But she was curious about who Stella would be without the armour of her professionalism.

_ Don’t bother. I’ll be sure to make something without tuna this time :) _ . Reed replied.

_ And no mushrooms. I’ll be there at 7.30.  _


	10. Chapter 10

Stella was utterly exhausted from the nightmare that was the Met’s Diversity board. For starters, they’d only used the 2010 Equality Act as a source to draw their objectives from, which wasn’t very ambitious at all, and furthermore, she was sure there were at least two people on there whose sole mission it was to derail and hinder the committee’s work by being deliberately ignorant. She was stewing about it on the drive to Reed’s. So when Reed’s youngest, Emily, greeted her by running towards her at the doorstep to show off her phonics skills and using whatever word popped into her head at the sight of Stella. (“Pale, puh-eih-lll”), Stella was a little overwhelmed and froze. 

“Well done, Emily. There’s an uhh at the end too. It’s a silent uh.” Reed said to her daughter. She turned to Stella. “We’ve been practising.”

“Yes, I can tell.” Stella leaned in to give Reed a peck on her mouth. Reed turned her head sideways and it landed on her cheek. 

Reed looked a little embarrassed. “As far as they know, you’re my friend. Come inside and meet Laura.” She took Emily by the hand. “That’s Stella, mummy’s friend.” Laura turned her head around as they walked and waved to Stella.

Laura was sitting at the kitchen table with a drawing, and had dabs of red and green paint on her cheeks and all over her wrists. She looked serious, and was deep in concentration.

“Hi Laura,” said Stella, remembering just in time that children don’t tend to shake hands. Laura barely looked up from her drawing. 

“Hi.” 

“What are you drawing?”

Laura furrowed her brow, in concentration or annoyance. Stella smiled. “That used to annoy me too, when grown-ups asked me what I was drawing. Surely they could see what it was?”

Stella found traces of Reed in Laura’s serious demeanor, her hunched over shoulders and dedication to her work. 

Reed looked over Laura’s shoulder. It was a drawing of the four of them, mummy, daddy, Laura and Emily. “It’s time to put that away, sweetheart,” she told her oldest. 

“Five more minutes,” Laura protested. 

“No, I need set the table, darling.”

Laura rolled her eyes, took her painting and left the room. Reed sighed.

“She’s been like this since the move. It’s been hard for her.” 

“Hmm.” Stella sidestepped the subject. “What are we having for dinner?”

Reed was turned towards the sink with the food, and was silent for a moment. “Roast chicken. There’s cutlery in that drawer if you want to help out. I’m going to have to wrangle the girls into washing their hands and coming to the table now.”


	11. Chapter 11

Over dinner, Stella was enjoying the chance to regale Reed with the tale of the Met’s diversity board. 

“And then, if you can believe it, he said, ‘what about racism against white people? All this policy is doing is giving promotions to non-white people who haven’t worked as hard as I have.’ I nearly spat out my coffee. So I fixed him with a stare and said, ‘if you ever find yourself in a situation where powerful institutions are prejudi--’”

“Mummy, look, I made a drawing in my mashed potatoes,” Emily proudly said, tugging at her mother’s sleeve. 

“Emily, you know mashed potatoes are for eating, not for drawing. Now hurry up, your food is getting cold,” Reed admonished.

Emily pretended not to have heard. “Stella, Stella, look at my drawing.”

“Stella’s not interested in your childish drawing,” Laura said to her little sister. “She was talking about grown up things.”

“Laura! Don’t be so mean to your little sister.”

“I’m not being mean! That’s just the truth.”

Then Emily started crying, because nobody had looked at her drawing. Big crocodile tears appeared. 

It had a domino effect on Laura, who followed her little sister’s lead and started sniffling.

Reed sighed an exhausted sigh and picked up Emily, gesturing to Stella to comfort the older one.

Stella froze again. If there were any children at the office, usually she’d let her junior staff accompany them to see the specialised children’s therapists. Now this little creature looked at her with a touch of resentment and a neediness that she didn’t quite know what to do with. 

She reached out to stroke her hair. 

“It isn’t fair,” Laura said resolutely between sobs. “I just said what is the truth. You’re not interested in Emily’s childishness.” 

“Now, now, don’t say that.” 

When Reed came back moments later from cooling Emily’s face with a washcloth she found Stella and Laura still in this stand-off. Reed shot Stella a look and used some kitchen roll to wipe Laura’s face. 

“Mummy’s not cross, darling. I don’t think you’re going to finish that, are you? Let’s get you in the bathtub and ready for bed.” Laura sniffled a few more times before being picked up and carried upstairs.

Stella was unsure of what to do next. Am I supposed to help with bath time, she thought, or does she want me to put away the leftovers?

She decided to put the dishes on the counter and to grab some wine glasses. It took uncomfortably long for Reed to come back. Stella replied to a few emails while she waited.


	12. Chapter 12

“They’re on the iPad before bedtime. I’ll go back upstairs in a bit to tuck them in.” Reed started putting away the cold chicken. “I don’t expect you to be a surrogate parent, but it would be nice if you showed some interest in them during dinner time.”

Stella scoffed. “I offered to find a childminder.” 

It was Reed’s turn to be annoyed. “I don’t want to hide my children from you every time you see me. They’re a part of my life, of me. If you want to be in a relationship with me, then you have to accept that they’ll be around.”

Stella’s eyes went from lukewarm to frosty in less than a second. “I never said that I would be in a relationship with you, Tanya.”

Reed stayed perfectly still, but for a second her eyes looked as if she’d been stabbed. The hurt flashed to anger. “Then why don’t you just go now, Stella? Huh? Make this easier for the both of us. If you’re only sticking around for sex then you were out of luck tonight anyway.” 

For a moment Stella contemplated just walking out and deleting Reed’s phone number. Then she wouldn’t have to deal with this messiness, this domesticity that she never asked for, never promised. 

Emily yelled from upstairs: “Mummy, it’s story time! Come upstairs!”

Reed gave no indication she’d heard her but went upstairs. Stella stood at the kitchen counter, deciding whether to walk out or join Reed. After two more work emails she took her heels off and walked upstairs on her tippy toes, careful not to disturb Reed. On the landing she could see Reed on her eldest girl’s bed with her two daughters leaning on her either side while she read them a story; the door was slightly ajar. 

_‘“Guess how much I love you,” said the Nutbrown Hare.  
“As I high as I can hop.”’_

Emily had fallen asleep already. Laura was spellbound. Reed caught a glimpse of Stella but pretended not to notice. When Laura saw that her mother had seen Stella, she smiled a shy smile towards Stella. Stella felt compelled to join them. The mattress sagged as she sat down next to Laura.

“We just read this book for Emily,” she confided in Stella, although Emily was very much still fast asleep. “I’m too old for it.”

Stella was amused. Only 7 or 8 years old, and already a self-consciousness that was more becoming of a tween girl was settling in around her. She squeezed Laura’s shoulder. “I’m sure you are.”

Reed ignored Stella, and finished tucking her children in. Stella stood watching near the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The children's book is The Adventures of Little Nutbrown Hare by Sam McBratney.


	13. Chapter 13

Stella brought the wine glasses to the sofa, where Reed was sprawled out. 

“I’m sorry I snapped. I’ve been stressed out lately,” Reed said.

“That’s understandable. I guess I should have paid more attention to them.”

“It’s just that they’re my children, you know. They’re a part of me. I wish that I’d met you when I could have gone off and had a little dalliance for a bit, but those things don’t come so easily to me anymore. I thought that perhaps I could keep the two separate, at least for a while, but I can’t.”

Stella tucked her legs under her. “I don’t want you to feel like you need to separate parts of your life in order to be around me.”

Reed stared into the middle distance for a bit. “Stella, you said you never promised a relationship. And I get that. I’m recently divorced, I probably should take a bit of time to heal myself. But I’ve never done open-ended things well. I want to know. I want clarity. I want the other person to try to really get to know me and not run when they first encounter my foibles.”

Stella took a deep breath and played with her ring. “I only do open-ended relationships. It’s a choice I made a while ago. I’ve told you this.” 

Reed reached over to trace Stella’s ankles, so nude without her heels. “Is there anything about me that isn’t compelling enough for you to stay?”

“No, no, no, Reed, not at all. This is what suits me, my nature, the life I’ve built. If I'd been younger I'd be tempted to try. But when I try I end up only hurting the other person. I don’t want to hurt you.” Stella looked anguished. “It’s quite the opposite really. I am fascinated by you, and I don’t want you to hurt.”

“So in order to protect me from some imaginary hurt that you will supposedly inflict on me, you don’t try at all? You just stay in your comfortable distance from love so that you don’t inevitably damage someone? Stella, this may sound counter-intuitive but you have the right to hurt the ones you love if you help them heal. You are not a burden to be with. That is a vicious, vicious lie.”

Stella had been welling up while Reed was talking, and a silent stream of tears ruined her makeup as it streamed down her face. 

“Sometimes you have to be broken a little in order to grow. Like me and Michael. Yes, it hurts to be apart and to have those conversations and to watch someone shatter. But we’d settled into a mediocre rhythm that served no-one.”

Reed cupped Stella’s face and kissed some of her tears away. This was too much, too close for Stella. She untangled herself from Reed and got up to find her shoes, while furiously dabbing at her face to get rid of the smudged mascara and tears.


	14. Chapter 14

_____

_Belfast, 7 months ago._

“Mum? Hi, it’s me. I’m okay, you know the case has been harrowing. I wanted to ask you about something else actually. Yes, I know the media’s been all over it. But that’s not why I’m ringing you. A few weeks ago, a colleague tried to force himself on me and I fended him off. No, I’m okay. I’m fine. Honestly. He didn’t do anything. Don’t worry. But it’s not on. I want him to realise that it’s not on. But I don’t know if reporting him is the best way to do that.”

Stella fell quiet as she listened to her mum’s advice. 

_____

_Belfast, 7 months ago._

“Ma’am?” Dani stood expectantly at Stella’s door.

“Dani.” Stella sighed. She took off her glasses and placed them among the stack of papers on her desk. “Would you close the door please? Thank you. You will remember the night that Spector broke into my hotel room. There is another matter that occurred that night.” Stella hesitated, unsure on how to proceed.

Dani picked up on Stella’s hesitation. “Is it about ACC Burns, ma’am? I noticed he was there at the scene.”

“Yes. You are aware that I get my needs met, even when I am away. There is a history between me and him.” Stella stared coolly at Dani, unashamed about her sexual history. She’d known about her sex life for a while, anyway.

Dani felt her cheeks flush, right at the time that she didn’t want that to happen at all. Her crush on Stella was something she wanted to keep hidden from her, because she knew that she didn’t stand a chance, and when she was reminded that Stella had slept with what seemed like the majority of her colleagues except her she felt so embarrassed.

“No need to be embarrassed by that, Dani. I’m telling you this is because I want to ask you to do the following for me, and there can be absolutely no gossip about it. None at all. I know that you have never done such a thing, but I just want to make it clear. That night, Burns crossed a line that I hadn’t expected him to. I want to look into making a report, but I need some information first.” She raised an eyebrow to find confirmation.

Dani’s protective nature took over and she moved a little closer to Stella’s desk. “Are you okay, ma’am? Did he hurt you?” 

“I’m fine, Dani, but thank you for asking. I nearly broke his nose in return, so he’s the who’s hurt, not me.” Stella smirked.

Dani couldn’t help but smile at such poetic justice. Burns, who stuck his nose into anything Stella-related.

“Would you find out how things really work around here when making a report? I know about the HR guidance and the policies and the promises and the marketing-speak on the Intranet, but I think we both know that that is mere obfuscation. Can you find out about women who’ve filed it before and what their experiences were? I want to know if this will be a good use of my time here or if it will just exhaust me.”

“Yes ma’am, I can try. But there are confidentiality clauses to do with anything HR-related. I’m not sure anyone will want to be open about those things.”

“I am aware, Dani. That’s why I am asking you to do this unofficially. Do it in a way that can’t get linked back to me and what supposedly might have happened that night between me and Burns. I don’t want anyone to be prejudiced with fairy tale stories before I even file the report. I know you’ll find a way.” 

“Yes ma’am.” Dani turned towards the door to leave.

“Oh, and one more thing. Is there any gossip making the rounds already?” Stella asked.

Dani looked at her shoes. “Not about Burns, no, ma’am.”

Stella knew exactly what she was omitting. “But there is about someone else, isn’t there?”

Dani pleaded with Stella’s eyes to not force her to continue. Stella was unrelenting in her gaze. “Yes. About the pathologist.” Dani thought she saw a flicker of pride in Stella’s composed expression, but wasn’t sure. 

“Right. That’s all, Dani.”

Dani breathed an audible sigh of relief when she closed Stella’s door behind her. Gail McNally saw her leave Stella’s office and smiled. 

“Sexy Stella’s sending you out on another personal errand, isn’t she?” she said with a wink as she came up behind Dani. 

“Oh, shush,” Dani admonished her. “No, she’s just asking me to do some desk work.”

“Right then. And what is that?” Gail teased her.

“Erm… I need to cross-check a couple of things.” 

Gail merely raised her eyebrows at Dani’s obvious lie and dropped the subject.


	15. Chapter 15

_Present day, London_

“Think about your career, Gibson. You were so promising before the internal report came up. It is only out of concern for your career that I’ve decided to share this piece of information with you. You and ACC Burns, as much as you’ve admitted to me, shared a personal history. It explains his actions.” Commander Dodson looked at Stella with compassion.

Stella felt her temper flare up, but contained it, as after all, Dodson was her real boss. “It might to you, --”

Jill Dodson held her hands up. “I’m going to stop you right there, Stella. My personal opinion is irrelevant. All I am saying is, that’s how it looks. And now that this PSNI disciplinary matter has been pinged back to us, it is incumbent on us to ensure that none of our officers are tainted by your personal decisions. It is my understanding that they want a character reference to see how likely your allegations are. It is important you know that your slate is not entirely clean, Stella. You are frequently combative, dismissive, cold…”

“Frankly, I think it is sexist nonsense that they even asked about a character reference. Can cold women not get sexually assaulted?” Dodson so frequently made Stella feel as if she was getting a scolding from her mum for socking one of the boys after they pulled her pigtails.

Dodson raised her eyebrows to warn Stella not to continue. “It is procedure, Gibson. It is what has been tried and tested and what works. It is not for you to decide nilly-willy to do away with robust evidence-gathering measures. If you want to do well here at the Met, you need speak diplomatically, and not just revert to whatever pops into your head. To accuse anybody of sexism is heinous, and frankly, a touch old-fashioned.”

She took a step closer to Stella, who was still standing near the door. 

“You need to learn, Stella, that your opinion does not matter. Like mine. All you need to do is learn the rules of the game. Work hard enough, and you’ll get there.” She gave Stella a warm smile. “Are we still on for the mentoring session?”

It took every inch of Stella’s willpower not to respond to Dodson’s ‘advice’. “Yes. Could you tell me what the next steps are for this disciplinary matter?”

“It is in the HR handbook, Gibson.”

“I am aware of that, but this request by the PSNI seems to have veered from standard procedure. And it’s taken longer than the proscribed timeline to open and investigate the matter,” Stella said. 

“Well, Gibson, I’m not privy to any of the factors that must have gone into the decision-making, but I am confident that it is robust. The PSNI have really cleaned up their act after the… issues in the last century and it is not for us to doubt them. There are power relations here that are delicate.”

Stella felt dumb for having any faith in these procedures to begin with. But she had to see it through now. She excused herself and left Dodson’s office.

Reed whizzed past her, on her way to file some paperwork for a burial. 

“Tanya?” 

Reed gave her a wan smile. They hadn’t spoken since Stella left Reed’s flat a week ago. Stella was overwhelmed by how much the mere presence of this woman flooded her senses.

“Do you have any time for a chat today?” Stella said.

Reed looked reluctant. “I’m quite busy today, Stella. This doesn’t seem like the right time.”

“Just a quick coffee. I have something I want to get off my chest.”

Reed agreed.


	16. Chapter 16

“As much as I’m sympathetic to your report, Stella, it’s a little unfair of you to ambush me with the promise of coffee and not even address what happened last Saturday.” Reed touched Stella’s forearm lightly in an empty canteen.

Stella looked at Reed for a moment, drinking in the concern in her brown eyes. “Perhaps. I’m sorry if it’s unexpected. I just didn’t think it would be so difficult for a fucking police force to launch a remotely competent investigation in a clear cut case of sexual harassment,” Stella said.

“There’s another way of looking at it. I don’t think the police was ever meant to punish perpetrators that came from within the same tier of the class system, or that are in some way similar to the men at the top. And Burns is at the top. It was always going to be an uphill battle. People have so much unconscious prejudice against people like us, especially when we challenge established ways of being, of investigating, of behaving. But you are sidestepping what I just said. You do that quite frequently for someone who prides herself on being direct.” Reed smiled softly to let Stella know her words weren’t meant to sting.

Stella knew Reed was right. She relaxed her stiff body posture and let her legs fall against Reed’s under the table. “I apologise” she mumbled. “I know I’m avoidant. I don’t know why I left. I didn’t want you to feel like I’d rejected you. But it seems as if we just want different things out of this relationship and I don’t know how to reconcile them.”

“I suppose that’s true, yes. And I like you too, Stella. I’m not letting you slip away so easily,” Reed said.

Stella looked up and directly into Reed’s gaze when she heard that. She couldn’t stop herself from grinning.

“What are you going to do, Stella? Be single forever?” Reed said.

Stella’s grin disappeared quickly. “You say it as if it’s a bad thing. We are part of a tiny group of women on earth in this period of history who have the luxury of choosing aloneness. It is not loneliness. It’s a choice of minimalism in my life, and it’s one that brings me a lot of peace. It’s not for you to judge,” Stella said.

“I’m not judging, I’m asking,” Reed said. “Do you honestly prefer working insane hours and sleeping on your cot to a relationship?”

“Who says they’re mutually exclusive? And, yes, you are judging. I’m not some lonely spinster, pining for a family life she’s too damaged to go after.”

“Well, you did make it clear they are mutually exclusive,” Reed said. “And you’re right, too. If you work long hours, it’s a choice you’ve made. And I admire it, in some way, because I would have never felt so free to make that choice.”

“I don’t feel like I made a choice between a career and intimacy.”

Reed sighed. “We’re going in circles.”

“Well, what about you then? Why can’t you compromise?” Stella asked, leaning back in her chair.

“Because I am way too in love for that to even be a remote possibility.”


	17. Chapter 17

_Belfast, 7 months ago._

Dani was just applying some last minute eyeliner before Jackson’s retirement drinks when Stella walked into the bathroom.

“Didn’t think you were the type for primping,” Stella said with a hint of a smile. 

Oh God, thought Dani. This was the stuff of her fantasies. Both after hours, in a secluded space without much chance of intrusion. Whenever she caught sight of Stella unexpectedly, her heart jumped and her heart sank. She didn’t really want to be examined by Stella’s piercing gaze because she was afraid Stella might uncover Dani’s humongous crush on her. But, ohmygod, Stella. The pleasure she got from just looking at her was often worth the possibility of exposure. 

“I did manage to get hold of that nail varnish before shops opened, didn’t I?” Dani somehow managed a half-witty reply. Put that on your list of accomplishments for today, Dani thought.

“Good point,” Stella said before going into a stall. 

Well, this was awkward. She didn’t want to hear her boss do anything on the toilet. She finished a messy wing and walked towards the door with the eyeliner still in hand.

“Dani?” Stella called out from behind the stall. 

“Yes, ma’am?” Dani stopped dead in her tracks. 

“If you are going to Jackson’s leaving drinks it would be a good place to find out more about any sexual harassment reports.”

“I was thinking the same.”

“Good. Be sure to talk to Catherine, she works in HR.” 

Dani could hear her toilet flushing and was caught in between the impulse to get as far away from Stella as possible to prevent making a fool of herself and the thought that that might be quite rude because Stella expected Dani to wait for her. 

Stella came out of the stall and raised an eyebrow. An impossibly perfectly groomed eyebrow. 

“Are you okay to talk to Catherine?” she asked again, slightly impatient. 

“Erm… of course,” Dani mumbled.

“Okay, off you go then, no need to arouse further suspicion by us arriving together.”

Dani smiled to herself, turning her head away from Stella. She knew Stella was only talking about suspicion about them collaborating in the professional sphere but she liked hearing it anyway. 

Upon arriving in the pub, which was just across the street from the station, the familiar smell of spilled beer and lingering cigarette smoke made her relax instantly, a scent memory of good times.

“Dani.” Gail was waving to get her attention, standing at the bar. “Got you a glass of red to start off with. It’s busy, isn’t? By the way, I really hope you don’t mind but there’s someone I think you’d like…” She turned around to find someone in the crowd, and walked a few steps to grab her elbow. “This is Catherine, Catherine, this is Dani.” A tall blonde wearing a tight grey dress extended her hand.

“Lovely to meet you.”

The first thing Dani noticed was how pretty she was, and secondly, how Gail was grinning like a madwoman. 

“Likewise,” she croaked, hopefully sounding somewhat smooth. Gail’s look of incredulity told her she did not.


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I'm participating in Fandom Trumps Hate, which means you can commission something from me from $5, which will go to a charity of your choice. Check it out here: https://fandomtrumpshateofferings.tumblr.com/post/155742286382/starsonyourskin-fth-contributor-page

“There’s a table just over there,” Gail pointed and ushered them all in the same direction. Catherine and Dani both sat down, but Gail conveniently ‘realised’ she didn’t have a drink and needed to go to the bar to go and get one. Christ on a bike, was it that obvious that she was single? 

“Are you an officer?” Catherine seemed confident and keen to get to know Dani. Her gaze stayed on Dani’s face, her lips, her eyes, a bit too long for her to be straight. This could be fun, Dani thought. 

So fun, that when Stella entered the bar, Dani didn’t even notice it. Nor did she notice Stella’s smug smirk when she saw how Catherine was leaning towards Dani and how their knees were lightly touching underneath the table. Gail joined her superintendent at the bar for a moment.

“You were right, Catherine is into women. How did you know?” Gail asked Stella.  
“One has ways of finding out,” Stella said enigmatically, a little twinkle in her eye. Gail didn’t pry, but merely raised her drink to toast with Stella’s. 

In between gazing at Catherine’s curled blonde hair and her slender wrists, Dani remembered the assignment her boss had given her. She waited for Catherine to finish her story about organising Reclaim the Night marches at uni.

“Forgive me for asking, and tell me if I’m overstepping, but considering you work in HR -- a friend of mine wants to look into reporting sexual harassment. She knows how it works formally, but it might be good to have a little insight into what actually happens.”

Catherine shifted in her seat uncomfortably. “I’m not supposed to tell you anything related to that, especially actual cases.”

“I know that, but I don’t need names and faces. I just want to know how it’s responded to in the office. Do people make assumptions before investigating? Do they follow the guidebook religiously?” Dani knew she was pushing her luck, but tried anyway. She couldn’t let Stella down.

“Look, when I accepted the role, I had to sit through lots training sessions on confidentiality, and these types of situations -- when you’re in a bar, having a drink, saying stuff you know you shouldn’t, were highlighted especially as an easy way to get fired.” Catherine looked a little apologetic. 

“Sure. But as a feminist, don’t you think that we should actually talk about what’s happened to us, especially when it’s men we work with and we know our colleagues might be in similar danger?” Dani said. 

“Well, if that’s true, then tell me who assaulted your friend?” Catherine countered.

“I… can’t. It’s not for me to say, it’s for her.” 

“Exactly.” Catherine said. 

“But the thing is -- Dani was quite eager to get back to the flirting but she dreaded having nothing to say to Stella. “She will report it. She just needs to know that she isn’t going to punished for it, or made to feel like she is somehow guilty.”

“Honestly, I can’t answer that. Because as far as I know, there haven’t been any reports. Not in the last two years, which is how long I’ve worked here.”

“But… how is that possible?” 

Catherine shrugged. “I don’t know what to tell you. Perhaps it’s for the same reason why your friend is reluctant to report. Or perhaps there’s just very little of that stuff going on at our department.”

“I don’t think so,” Dani said incredulously. “Aren’t you curious why that is?”

“I am. But it’s not my remit.” Catherine said. She moved a strand of hair from Dani’s face and lingered at her jawline for a bit. Dani breathed in deeply. She tried again.

“But before sexual harassment policies came in, it was no-one’s remit. Somebody had to make it their business.” She reciprocated Catherine’s move and took a strand of her hair and loosely wrapped it around her finger and let it go. “Could you try, for me?”

Catherine giggled. “Using seduction as a pressure mechanism, I should write you up right now.”

“But my ‘seduction’,” Dani said mockingly, “is reciprocal, hopefully?” There was a helplessness in Dani’s hazel eyes that made it hard for Catherine not to reassure.

“Yeah, of course it is. You’re cute,” Catherine said. To emphasise her point she ran her hand up Dani’s thigh.

Dani snickered and turned slightly pink. 

Gail, still watching at the bar, noticed, and looked around to share a look of accomplishment with Stella. Stella, at a table with Reed, spotted Gail and winked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I'm participating in Fandom Trumps Hate, which means you can commission something from me from $5, which will go to a charity of your choice. Check it out here: https://fandomtrumpshateofferings.tumblr.com/post/155742286382/starsonyourskin-fth-contributor-page


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I'm participating in Fandom Trumps Hate, which means you can commission something from me from $5, which will go to a charity of your choice. Check it out here: https://fandomtrumpshateofferings.tumblr.com/post/155742286382/starsonyourskin-fth-contributor-page

___

Dani was a little late the next morning to her private meeting with Stella, and Stella noticed her hair was mussed and she was wearing a blouse a touch more feminine than she usually would. 

She looked up and down Dani’s body to let her know she’d noticed when Dani came in. Dani turned around to close the door and took a second to get rid of her embarrassment.

“Had a good night, Dani?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Stella raised an eyebrow. God, she enjoyed this game a little too much. But she also knew, from experience, that the only way to get rid of shame and embarrassment was to wade straight through it and come out the other side. “I take it you met with Catherine?” Stella asked.

“Yes, I met Catherine, she was lovely.” 

“That wasn’t what I asked,” Stella said sternly. Give the woman a break, she thought to herself, as soon as she’d said it.

Dani froze, going over their exchange in her head. “Oh! Erm, yes, we talked about reporting sexual harassment cases. She’d said that no-one had reported anything in the last two years. I asked why, and she couldn’t really tell me. She said that it was probably because nothing much happened around here.”

Stella scoffed. 

“But I asked her to find out a bit more, and I think she will,” Dani said.

“Right. And when will you see her next?” Stella asked.

“Tuesday night. Tuesday,” Dani said. 

“Good. Thank you, Dani.”

Just as Dani was leaving Stella’s office, Stella whispered “have fun” under her breath, which Dani could just about make out, and it made her smile.

___

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I'm participating in Fandom Trumps Hate, which means you can commission something from me from $5, which will go to a charity of your choice. Check it out here: https://fandomtrumpshateofferings.tumblr.com/post/155742286382/starsonyourskin-fth-contributor-page


	20. Chapter 20

_Present day, London_

“Because I am way too in love for that to even be a remote possibility.”

Stella’s eyebrow shot up when she heard Reed say that. She felt a little second hand embarrassment for Reed, even though she hadn’t been the who’d been so candid.

Reed wasn’t embarrassed at all. She looked into Stella’s eyes, reading her reaction. “Well? How do you feel?” she said. She let the seconds pass calmly while Stella tried to compose herself enough to respond. 

“That’s very honest of you,” Stella deflected.

Reed felt incredibly annoyed with Stella. That’s all she was going to get? For putting herself out there like that? Perhaps she wasn’t worth the chase at all if she was going to be so closed off. She sighed a frustrated sigh. “Really? That’s all you’re going to say?” Reed stood up and started gathering her things. She understood that if this was going to work at all, Stella needed to be the one to come to her.

Stella observed Reed’s reactions quietly, and saw the chance to have a relationship with her slip through her fingers every second she waited to speak up. When Reed pushed her chair in and turned around, and Reed was nearly gone, gone from her space, her thoughts, her time, her life, something deep inside her compelled her to say something.

“Reed?” 

She turned around, her posture defensive, arms wrapped around herself, bag slung in front of her to put something in between her and Stella.

“Then let’s try.”

That didn’t assuage Reed much. She looked up at the ceiling, unimpressed at Stella’s meager words. Too little, too late. Stella realised she needed to go to that place that had always been so scary for her, where she said what she really meant, asked for what she needed, and then had to bridge those stupid seconds of silent expectation that the other person would walk away. And of course she had created the situation where that would be most likely to happen. If she’d done it from the start, when Reed was so into her she couldn’t stop herself from kissing Stella and invited her to her family home, her private space, then she wouldn’t be in this dumb mess to begin with. Instead, she’d pushed and pushed and pushed Reed with her privacy and her preferences and her self-righteousness so that if Reed walked away, the hurt would sting even more. But if she stayed, a little part of Stella would be rewritten. 

She stood up and walked to Reed. “I’m sorry I’m so… private sometimes. I don’t mean to be. If I have a choice between you walking away completely and you asking me to go somewhere in a relationship I rarely go… then I want the relationship, Reed. Even if it makes me uncomfortable sometimes. I really appreciate your honesty.”

Reed still looked at her expectantly, but her body language had softened. She’d dropped her bag at her feet and was looking at Stella’s eyes.

“Do you appreciate my honesty, Stella, or do you love me back? And I’m not the one issuing an ultimatum here. That’s all you.”

Reed could see the girl in Stella. She was fidgeting with the black hair tie around her wrist, and didn’t meet Reed’s eyes. Stella was deciding whether to quarrel with Reed’s idea that it was all on her, this stand off between them, or if she should go deeper.

“I have a crush on you,” she mumbled. 

Reed smiled. It was so unlike Stella to be so bashful. She kissed her on the lips, lightly, with no expectation of return.

Stella regained her air of authority with that first touch. She kissed back, hungrily, so strongly that Reed took a step backwards to accommodate her. Reed put her hand on Stella’s chest and pushed lightly to tell her to stop. Stella let her cheek fall next to Reed’s, her breath hot in her neck.

“We’re at work,” Reed said. Stella could hear the smile in her voice, and kissed her cheekbone in response.

“Can I see you tonight? The girls will be around later, but they’re at their nana’s until 9.”

“Yes. I want to finish this.” Stella kissed that nude spot between Reed’s earlobe and the onset of her jawline. 

Reed giggled. She gave Stella one last look and left the canteen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I'm participating in Fandom Trumps Hate, which means you can commission something from me from $5, which will go to a charity of your choice. Check it out here: https://fandomtrumpshateofferings.tumblr.com/post/155742286382/starsonyourskin-fth-contributor-page


	21. Chapter 21

_Belfast, 7 months ago._

Dani was due in a couple of minutes, but Stella had enough time to run down and get a decent cup of coffee. 

She ran into a Clement’s and decided to get Dani one as well -- she was meeting her in a few minutes anyway. She spotted Reed from the corner of her eye. 

“Hi,” Reed offered tentatively. They hadn’t spoken much since the night Stella fell asleep in Reed’s office and then proceeded to examine a corpse without Reed’s permission. 

“Hello. How’s your day been?” Stella replied, flatly. Things were still awkward after Reed’s rejection in Bert’s Bar, although Stella very much pretended to herself she hadn’t been hurt by it at all. The moment at Jackson’s leaving drinks had been brief, as Reed had needed to go home and put the girls to sleep. She was wearing a maroon lipstick that was really lovely on her, and she was wearing her hair down, another distraction that made Stella look at Reed longer than was strictly necessary for the interaction. 

“Alright. Busy.” Reed smiled as if she’d just let Stella in on a secret. “Looks like we had the same idea.” She nodded towards Stella’s two coffee cups. 

“Yes, the stuff in the kitchenette is hard to wash down,” Stella said. She was attempting to keep it light, not get into any real conversations. “Lovely to see you, but got to go, meeting.” She couldn’t stop herself from staring at the way Reed’s eyeliner opened up her brown eyes, the bit above her pupil slightly thicker than the rest. She was gorgeous, Stella thought to herself.

“Right. PC Ferrington?” 

Now, how did she know that? 

Her surprise must have been evident on her face.

“Caught with your hand in the cookie jar, Stella? Didn’t think you’d move so quickly,” Reed said teasingly, not at all acidically, but it stung, nonetheless. 

“No, there’s nothing going --”

“Stella. Professor Reed-Smith,” Burns greeted them both. 

God, thought Stella. Not him, here, now.

“Stella, regarding your request to draw up interview strategies in the event that we might…” 

Burns decided to treat this moment as a welcome opportunity to undermine her in public while Stella watched, horrified, Reed walking through the doors of the coffee shop with that idea still lodged firmly in her head, when she had done everything in her power not to sleep with Dani. 

“Let’s talk about this upstairs, some other time, shall we? Perhaps not in public?” Stella decided to just interrupt him ruthlessly to put an end to his sputtering. It hadn’t gone unnoticed that Burns would latch onto any work-related excuse to talk to her for prolonged periods of time. It wasn’t urgent, anyway, she thought to herself, an exercise in justifying interrupting men, that ingrained girlhood training that was still present after years of supervisory functions.

And… bingo. The kicked-a-puppy-look appeared on his face. Stella couldn’t be arsed to soothe him, made an excuse and left the coffee shop. She replayed the interaction with Reed in her head. There must be gossip, then, that her and Dani were sleeping together.


	22. Chapter 22

So when she put down the two coffees in front of Dani, who had been waiting outside her office, she was distracted. 

“Thank you,” Dani said.

“Dani, is there any gossip about us sleeping together?”

Dani looked like Taylor Swift after Ellen DeGeneres’s Halloween prank. “No, ma’am, not that I’m privy to.” 

Stella was leaning on her desk, mulling this over. “But are there rumours about the both of us that we’re not straight?”

“Well, yes. Most of the colleagues I’m friendly with here know, and that sort of thing travels fast, so I imagine nearly everyone knows about me,” Dani said.

“And me?”

“I think some people saw you at a bar with the professor, so I think they probably drew their own conclusions.”

Stella felt a little violated. She wasn’t ashamed of her bisexuality, but she wanted to be in control of who knew and who didn’t. The idea of Eastwood or Burns casually discussing her sexual history with women by the water cooler made her want to retch. 

“And, do you think, Dani, that perhaps colleagues have taken the only two out women they know and figured that if we’re out, we must be having sex?”

Dani shifted nervously, moving from one foot to the other. She knew that was part of it, but she should probably tell her the whole truth. “I think that some officers noticed that I was your assistant, and that I sometimes ran personal errands for you, and that morphed into the idea of us spending time together personally, I think.”

“Is that it? Just two out women working closely together?”

“Well, we are a rare breed in the force,” Dani said.

“I don’t think so. Perhaps the fact that we’re out, but I like to live by the assumption that every woman is queer until proven otherwise, and I’ve only been proven wrong a few times.” Stella fixed Dani with a stare. “You should try it.” She paused, while Dani tried to figure out what to say in response. “Dani, are you sure that that is all it is?”

“One of my friends has a nickname for you. Sexy Stella.”

Stella made a little noise of disapproval. “Men are so quick to sexualise women in power. It’s the only way they feel comfortable around them, to take them down a peg. If they can judge me sexually, they are in contr--”

“I have a crush on you.” Dani couldn’t help herself. They were on the topic, she had to get it out. And the words just kind of left her lips without warning her brain and then she couldn’t take them back. Stella looked startled. Dani continued: “I think that might be the source of the rumours.”

“I did...know that, but thought that we could leave it unsaid,” Stella said. Stella saw that Dani looked uncomfortable, a little angry even.

“But, you wanted to know, ma’am. About the rumours. I think my friend might have betrayed my confidence and that’s how it’s spread.”

“Yes.” A pause. “You are right, Dani. Now that we have discerned where this has come from, let’s move on to what we’re here for.”


	23. Chapter 23

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: sexual harassment

She gestured for Dani to sit down. “Have you found out more about any sexual harassment reports in the past couple of years?”

Dani breathed in to centre herself after admitting to her boss that she had a crush on her. “Yes, ma’am. Catherine and I had a discussion on Tuesday after she’d gone through some historic cases. There were several reports before she came to work here, and out of six, two of them included disciplinary consequences for the men accused.”

“Right. And did you find out anything about the details of the reports?” 

“I did not, Catherine was still reluctant to share much given the confidentiality governing these cases,” Dani said.

“And was there anything on whether these men still work here?”

“No. She didn’t tell me anything about the identities of the people involved.”

“And could she find out anything in the paperwork about how the cases were handled? Were there long delays, or the decision-making bounced around to several people, or any disciplinary consequences for the women?” Stella asked.

“The paperwork was quite sparse, it didn’t really give any information about what happened in the intermediary bit between the reporting and the outcomes. Or at least I wasn’t told.”

Stella looked out the window for a while after hearing Dani’s new information. It really wasn’t much to go on, but the idea that so few cases had even been reported, and even fewer had any disciplinary actions enforced, was troubling. Yet, she knew that if she reported, she could pull a few strings via Catherine in HR if necessary. And if she didn’t, then who would? For a brief moment the thought occurred to her that if she reported, she might face more scrutiny and damaging consequences than Burns. After all, he was at the top of the food chain, and she was an outsider, biding her time before going back to London. Speaking of strings to pull, he probably had a few more than she did. Not to mention the force of his hurt and feelings of betrayal that he would bring to bear on her privately. 

“Ma’am?” Dani had been quietly studying her face as Stella was deciding. “I didn’t want to tell you at first, because it’s not related to our work, but I had an unpleasant experience with ACC Burns before you came in for the review.”

“Oh?”

“We were all at the pub for someone’s birthday and we were stood at the bar. He kind of… pressed into me. I moved, thinking it was an accident, but he did it again. And then he put his hand on my waist a couple of times when we were talking. I didn’t really want to say anything because it seemed so innocent, you know? It seemed like he was hoping for something more and I didn’t know how to tell him to knock it off, because I’m just a PC and maybe I read into it and he was just being friendly. And then he continued. Whispered in my ear a couple of times. As soon as I came home I took a scalding shower to wash his whiskey breath off my skin.”


	24. Chapter 24

“I’m so sorry, Dani.”

“It’s nothing really, it was just a bit uncomfortable,” Dani said, looking down. “I didn’t want to make it out to be a bigger deal than it was.”

“It seems like a pretty big deal to me. He purposely, repeatedly, violated your boundaries,” Stella said insistently, trying to catch Dani’s eye.

“He was drunk. It happens.” Dani wasn’t meeting her gaze. 

“But you were drunk at Jackson’s leaving drinks, and you did nothing inappropriate towards me. You didn’t even speak to me.”

Dani folded her hands in her lap. “That’s different.”

“Tell me how it’s different,” Stella said. 

Dani looked up to meet Stella’s soft, worried gaze. “You’re my boss.”

“Yes. So is he. Your boss’s boss, in fact.”

Tears were burning at the back of Dani’s eyes. “I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” she murmured. “I probably did something to encourage him. I didn’t tell him no. How could he have known if I didn’t tell him?”

Stella knew she was on dangerous ground here, but she wanted Dani to know that she had done nothing wrong. “Dani, imagine that if you had gone up to me at Jackson’s drinks, and flirted with me. How would you know if I reciprocated or not?”

Dani dabbed at her eyes quickly. She hadn’t even known that this had bothered her so much until she told Stella. “By your looks, and your body language. If you flirted back.”

“Right. Those are all clear signals. Signals you didn’t give him. He knew, and he didn’t care. He only cared about his own desires.”

“But it’s still different. Because he’s a guy. And I don’t think they’re as sensitive as women.”

“I think it takes a whole lot of sensitivity to become the Assistant Chief Constable in Belfast. And, yes it is different. You’ve been taught all your life that you have to be really careful with your attractions, to the point of not even acknowledging them to yourself. You are not at fault here, Dani. You did nothing wrong.” Stella looked at Dani. She still looked shaken. “Did you talk to any of your friends about this?”

“Yeah, I told Gail. She said that it was kind of like an open secret, I guess, that he gets like that at functions. She told me everyone knew to stay away from him.”

“Did you not think that was significant to mention to me?”

“Well, you seemed to be concerned with reports and HR, so it didn’t occur to me,” Dani said, somewhat apologetically.

“Right. Do you feel like you want to report it now?”

“Not particularly, no. It’s not much to go on. And he can just say I was imagining it, and if I want to be promoted at some point then I probably shouldn’t piss off the guys at the top too much,” Dani said, having clearly made her mind up.

Stella nodded slowly. “That’s your decision to make. Although I’d want you to know that I’d be with you every step along the way.”

“Thank you, ma’am. I appreciate that. But I think if we both reported at the same time, it would be perceived as some kind of vendetta against him.”

“Yes, you are probably right. I appreciate you coming in Dani, thank you.”


	25. Chapter 25

_Belfast, 7 months ago_

“Tanya.” Reed was filing out of a morning meeting with a cup of coffee in her hands, looking a little sleepy still. Stella walked up to her after most of her colleagues had left for their desks. 

“I don’t know what you’ve heard, but I just want to make sure that you know that I have never slept with Dani Ferrington.”

“Stella, that’s none of my business, really.” She looked perplexed at Stella’s frankness. “I was just teasing.”

“No, I know, I just didn’t want you to get the wrong idea.” Stella gave Reed a gentle smile, and left her to contemplate why Stella was so adamant about correcting her little swipe. She watched Stella push open the double doors to the open office space, and Stella looked over her shoulder as she pushed sideways, and smiled beguilingly. Reed hummed into her coffee, except it was more of a whine of unfulfilled desire. If only she wasn’t married. What would she do if she wasn’t married? She leant against the glass partition of the meeting room and imagined putting her hand on the back of Stella’s neck, beneath the shimmering waves of her curls and kissing her plum lipstick right off her mouth. 

Later, a voice whispered in her head. Later? There would be no later, she thought. She just needed to stick it out until Stella went back to London. She binned her cup and left for the morgue.

____

Stella was pacing in her office, trying to make her mind see the clues about Rose Stagg’s possible location that she knew were hidden in the scraps they’d gotten from Spector so far. She looked at her watch. Nearly 11 o’clock. She’d almost forgotten. A meeting had been scheduled to discuss her report. Her notebook was lying beneath scattered papers and pictures that were orphaned from their manila folders, but she found it, and quickly made her way to the HR office.

“Gibson, good of you to join us,” Aoife Taylor said. They’d clearly been waiting for her. “My name is Aoife Taylor, and we are joined here today by your lead for the report, Catherine Rich, and your colleague DCI Eastwood. Usually, these reports would be flagged up and sent through to the Chief Constable, but I am afraid that he has other matters to attend to that are more pressing.”

“Right, thank you Ms Taylor. I do have a question regarding DCI Eastwood’s presence here, though, as I am his superior? Can you explain to me his role in this report?” Stella asked.

“Well, considering your report is regarding your superior, we needed someone who understood the mechanics of the investigation to decide on further action, and we agreed to bring in Eastwood. He will be able to provide objectivity and clarity in regards to some practical measures we might take to protect our personnel. As you are aware, we have to first investigate your report before we can determine its veracity, but our guidebook states that we have to ascertain whether or not to take protective measures before launching an investigation.”

Stella understood that the only way they could talk about whether Burns was dangerous, to her, and to other female colleagues, was to speak in code, in the language of procedure and guidelines, measures and policy. A feeling of uneasiness washed over her. Uneasiness with having a male colleague here, who knew her well, who would likely be her ally, but it was a level of intrusion she never asked for. Uneasiness with the idea that this was now out of her hands, and that what she knew had happened was now to be established by someone who per definition set out to launch the investigation with a critical eye, who could decide that, no, she had made it up (to advance her career, because she’s a man-hating feminist, because Burns plays cards with him on Wednesdays, because she’s a slut and sleeps with women).


	26. Chapter 26

Eastwood cleared his throat. “I can assure you Ms Taylor, that that won’t be necessary. ACC Burns is a trusted colleague who poses no immediate danger to colleagues.”

Well, wasn’t it chivalrous of him to decide that Burns was fine? Stella knew that this was awkward for him, too. He’d been openly critical of Burns and the policing executive before, and to turn around and say that Burns was likely to assault his female colleagues was petulance bordering on a vendetta. Except that he was, and that Eastwood was thinking of his position, his opinion, and his experiences, rather than hers. 

“If I may just interject, Ms Taylor, the problem I think we’re facing here is that colleague Eastwood has experience with ACC Burns as a male colleague, not as a female one. With all due respect, he has no understanding of how a woman might feel in Burns’s presence, and how likely it might be for him to assault again,” Stella said.

“Gibson, I understand that there may be differences between our experience of Burns, but may I remind you that he did almost hit me after our exchange in the hallway,” Eastwood replied.

“I wasn’t aware that that had occurred, no, as Burn’s version of events left that out, but I would argue that it actually increases the likelihood of it happening again, rather than diminishing it,” Stella argued back.

“Colleagues, if I may,” Ms Taylor said, as if she were breaking up a fight on the playground. “As I’ve stated before, we brought in your colleague so that he could provide another perspective. A perspective that’s very valuable, because if the assault happened as you say it did, DSI Gibson, then you must be feeling some strong antipathy towards ACC Burns which can colour your judgement. We should remain objective in these situations. If we allow our feelings to run amok, then we might make some very poor decisions. I’m inclined to go with DCI Eastwood’s suggestion that no further protection is needed, based on the assumption that if he were truly a liability then we would have heard about it sooner in his 40-year career. An assumption that’s not unreasonable, I think.”

Stella was about to argue with her line of reasoning, but realised that she didn’t actually want their incident to change anything about the structure of the investigation. If Burns was separated from the case, she’d probably have to work with his boss, who had even less time for it and would put more pressure on her to wrap this is up as quickly as possible, when they needed all the time they could manage to find Rose. 

“Fine. I don’t think I need protection either, but I was pointing out a flawed line of reasoning. I’m happy to proceed.”

“Good. Then let’s proceed with your statement. Before we start, I want to remind you that it is procedure to inform the other party immediately after a statement’s been taken, and that we will give him an opportunity to provide his version of events. We will then see if we need any further information from either of you, or if there are any third parties who might provide more insight,” Ms Taylor said.

“Thank you. And what is the timeline for this investigation?”

“I’m not sure off the top of my head, but we endeavour to wrap things up as soon as we can. Ms Rich will be taking notes, if that’s okay with you?” She didn’t wait for Stella’s answer. “When did the incident occur?”


	27. Chapter 27

_Present day, London._

Stella’d shown up bearing take-away. She hadn’t dared to go near Indian, in case Reed had strong opinions about what constituted good Indian food. 

They’d kicked off their shoes after a long day, their limbs intertwining on the sofa. Reed sat up a little to grab Stella’s hand.

“I’ve missed good take-aways. Belfast hasn’t caught up with the 21st century,” she said.

“That’s not true. There’s plenty of good bistros and gastropubs,” Stella countered. For a moment she was struck by the domesticity of the scene. It’d been quite some time since she was caught holding hands with anyone who wasn’t under the age of 12. 

“No, I mean stuff that isn’t European. Or, like, organic and local. Or burgers.” Reed’s fingertips traced a soft little pattern on Stella’s hand.

“Yeah, I’m with you on that.”

“Look at that, it’s Stella Gibson not arguing a point till it’s been beaten to death,” Reed said jokingly, her hand giving an affectionate little squeeze.

Stella rolled her eyes. “I do that quite frequently, I’ll have you know. I have to pick my battles at work.”

“Sure, sure.”

“Are you happy to be back in London?” Stella asked, grabbing one of Reed’s feet and rubbing it.

“I am now, yeah,” Reed said, referring to Stella’s foot massage. 

Stella smiled. 

“Did you miss me, when I was in Belfast and you were here?” Reed asked.

Stella tried to move beyond the discomfort that rose to the surface when Reed asked the question. She didn’t feel comfortable admitting that she missed anyone, depended on someone consistently.

“I did.” That was what she could manage, for now. 

“Much?”

“A lot.” Stella paused, searching for the right words. “I knew I shouldn’t have got so attached to you when we didn’t even sleep together, and barely kissed, really, but it seemed quite inevitable. For some reason, I just did. I knew it was illogical, I knew you were married, and I thought at the time you didn’t feel the same, and I shouldn’t have wanted it, but then when I saw you again in Belfast…”

“And you found out I’d been living in London for a bit?”

“Yeah, that made me think you weren’t interested at all. Not even in my friendship. But well, that impression corrected itself quite quickly.”

Reed smirked. “Yes, it did.” Stella looked so differently to her now than she did before. Before, when she thought of Stella, an image of her in a black overcoat with golden curls came to mind, at the Sarah Kay crime scene, or the one where the addict had hung herself. Her searching eyes trained on her surroundings, finding a detail she would explain later, her thoughts skipping to future actions needing to be taken to work out how to prioritise them, a mind faraway but accessible. Faraway, in the sense that what she showed outwardly was always one step behind what was in her mind, but accessible in the sense that she would show it all, eventually, because she needed to communicate to do her job. In Reed’s presence, her being was different. She let herself overflow into the present moment, open to respond and react without having thought of what to say earlier. If the soul’s shaped like a bowl, hers was filled with liquid nitrogen, sifting and wafting through the air to meet Reed’s. But she didn’t need to tell Reed anything. She could withdraw at any moment, suddenly and without notice. But Reed was confident she wouldn’t. She knew now, what Stella did when she was afraid, and in time, Stella would find out what she did when she was afraid. 

Stella brushed a wisp of hair from the vicinity of Reed’s eyes out of the way, bringing Reed back to her. 

“Did you miss me?” Stella sounded small, as if she had to force the words to come out of her throat. 

“Did I miss you! I don’t want to sound like a love-sick teenager, but I was pining for you. You know, desire is rooted in absence. And I didn’t know if I could have you. I didn’t know it was really possible.”

“Even with your husband out of the picture?”

“Stella… I didn’t leave him for you…” Reed’s voice was tender and gentle. She moved her hands lightly against Stella’s stomach.

“No, I know, but the shape of your ideas about me must have changed once you were single.”

“Perhaps. But I was also very busy with arranging the move, transferring my job, making sure my kids were okay. There wasn’t much time to think, or to dream.” 

“Hmm. Speaking of your kids, Laura’s birthday is coming up, isn’t it?”

“Yes! How do you know? I don’t think I’ve mentioned it.” 

“There’s a birthday calendar in your loo. She’s taken over the entire month with scribbles and LAURA in all caps.”

“That’s not capital letters, that’s just her handwriting,” Reed corrected, smiling.

Stella chuckled. “Anyway, I spied a couple of dinosaurs in her room and I was wondering if you’d ever taken them to the Natural History museum? There’s a couple of nights where you can have a sleepover in the museum.”

“A sleepover, huh? I’m sure she would love that. Maybe the four of us could go.”

“With your ex?”

“No, with you. She wanted to have a separate day with her daddy.”

A warmth blossomed in Stella, that quickly turned to giddiness. “I love dinosaurs,” she whispered.


	28. Chapter 28

_6 months ago, Belfast._

An alarming amount of silence from HR had gone by since Stella had filed her initial report, and given her statement. That is not to say that Burns had been silent. He’d come into her office with his nostrils flaring, his voice barely contained. 

“I thought we’d come to an understanding,” he’d growled at her while she was getting ready for a meeting. “I’m not that kind of man. I would never, Stella. You know this. You know me.” He sounded serrated, his words a blade knifing open the wound that had barely begun to heal.

He’d looked at her like she’d betrayed him, failed him, abandoned him. His shock at her treachery was cut through with anguish and expectation. Like they’d had an unspoken agreement that no matter how badly he treated her, she would never tell anyone else. To do so was worse than Burns assaulting her. And for a moment she did feel sorry for him, until she remembered all the silent little digs he’d made, and she forced herself to list them in her head so she could feel her anger in his presence and hold her ground. 

“Sexual harassment? What is this, the 70s?” He looked so hurt. 

“That’s exactly the term for it, Jim. For what you did.” 

His face was the picture of incredulity, which rattled her. She wanted him to know, to know how men like him had always made her feel, like her very existence threatened to dissolve the fragile egos around her and everything would ground to a screeching halt because she simply existed. Behind the protective fixture of her desk, she snapped at him: “I’m not the only one you’ve done this to, Jim. I’m just the only one who feels able to step up and report.” She felt her steady control slipping through her fingers, her feelings a spinning toll whirling away from her. 

“What? You are making this up as you go, Stella. I knew you’ve always had anger issues towards men, but this takes the cake. May I remind you that you were the one who punched me? I should be reporting you.” His chest was heaving, adrenaline coursing through his veins, barely keeping himself from raising his voice.

In a flash of clarity, Stella could see that he would never understand. His ideas of who he was, a good man of faith, someone who’d done a great service to the city with his policing, and who deserved to be rewarded for it, a champion of women in the service, someone who could look beyond the sectarianism that had blighted his city, there was no room for the idea that he could possibly be sexist, or even worse, a violent man like the working class men he covertly despised so much. There was a break in his psyche that ensured he could not see. He didn’t understand that his come-on had not just been about his sexual desire for her, but the idea that he could take what he wanted, when he wanted. He was so worked up that there was no room for him to truly take in what she wanted to say.

“Who told you these lies, Stella? They should be questioned for spreading defamatory and malicious gossip. Is it Eastwood?” In his indignation, he’d stepped closer to her, like he was prepared to strangle the truth out of her.

“Oh, Jim.” Stella was tired of how suspicious he was, how little he trusted, and how much he thought he deserved. “Can you, for once in your life, stop thinking about yourself? I am protecting myself and drawing a line for you. I am saying that you can never go there again, not without my consent, and that you have to ask and listen.”

“It’s utterly ridiculous, Stella. Do you have any idea what impact this will have on my career?” His face was a mask contorted with resentment.

“A negligible effect, I’m sure. I’m starting to wonder why bothered.” She wanted him to feel the full weight of his actions, to understand the self-doubt and the confusion he caused women when he misused his power for his own gain, and maybe some form of professional consequences was the only way. 

“Negligible? Are you even working in the same police force as I am? These rumours will follow me for years.” He had his hands in his hair now, trying to fathom how his fellow patricians would look at him, taunt him, mock him. 

“Yes. That will probably be exactly the extent of it. Just rumours. And you’ll be fine,” Stella said, her throat filled with the choke of bitterness. 

“Do you not think that I deserve a satisfactory end to my career? That I haven’t worked excruciatingly long hours for years so that I could be where I am now? Why are you trying to take this away from me?” He was pleading now, pleading for an answer he could understand. The fragile alloy of his admiration and contempt for her was breaking down to its elements.

“It is not about what you deserve. We all deserve it all and we deserve nothing. This is not about your work, this is about you forcing me to have sex with you when I was clearly saying no.” He was trying to turn this around to her, to pivot, deflecting attention from him. A politician’s trick, inborn or ingrown. 

“You’re nonsensical, Stella. I’m starting to see that what everyone is saying about your man-hating is true.” And with that, he left her, stunned in her office. She didn’t have time to stew. She was late for a briefing that she was giving. When she shuffled into the incident room everyone was waiting for her, clearly thinking she was a hypocrite for forcing everyone to be on time while she could be late without penalty. 

____

When she’d returned to London, a letter had floated down to her doorstep after she’d spoken to Jill Dodson. She’d read the first sentence.

_Dear DSI Gibson,_

_We are hereby informing you that a complaint has been filed with regards to inappropriate relationships in the MPS and during your recent secondment to the PSNI. ___

Her shaking hands had to be restrained from tearing the thing up in anger. This is how he went after her. By putting her on the defense. Choosing to go after the things that she would be judged harshly for. Put on trial for consensual sex, while the harassers and assaulters went free. What was on trial here was her daring to have agency. A panel of judges for a deviant female sexuality. Her resolve hardened. 


	29. Chapter 29

____

That night, after the takeaway and the slack-limbed embrace and soft fingertips on clothed skin, Stella took Reed by the hand and they travelled. Their toes wriggled in wet sand on the shore, waves lapping, blood throbbing. The newness of their nakedness elicited questions and doubts in their own, respective minds. I hope she doesn’t notice how my thighs are curvier than when we met. If I lay like this, can she see how round my belly is? They started by walking, a steady rhythm of passing nightscapes in their souls. She turned Reed sideways and said: “Let me look at your silhouette.” So that Reed knew that she was exquisite in Stella’s eyes. And when Reed wanted to go on, Stella wasn’t done looking yet. She wanted to stay in the eternity of this still night, the heavens humming with their togetherness.

They clambered up low hills onto higher ones, until they reached a ridge so overbright it seemed impossible. But a sticky heat emitted from them that weaved them together into their exploration. Stella reached down and pulled Reed up with such fervour that she was wobbly on her thighs and had to be held up for the rest of the way. Muscles in their hands, wrists, thighs, tongues and arms aching with the night’s work. Reed had to be coaxed with words sometimes. So Stella would say: 

“Just like that. Stay there.” 

And

“Do you like this here? Or there?”

They were running now, hand in hand, destiny clear, breaths shallow and rapid.They’d reached a desert with plenty of oases. They’d found the missing dimension, that was eternally veiled but unwaveringly there. A ripple in space-time fabric brimming with numinosity. One with searing, beating sunshine that evaporated the water in your breath in an instant but preserved the wells needed for quenching thirst. An onsen filled with humidity, buoyancy and light. Violent delight. Then, a salvo of explosions, one, two, three, and when Reed pulled on a string within that made the whole world come crashing down on Stella, the obliteration of their star system was complete. Steadily the world formed again. Reed’s hair was black at Stella’s waist. Sinews, nerves and blood vessels returned to match their pace at the onset of their journey. All Stella could do was give in to the floodgate of emotion that had been torn open and let herself be held. 

____

Legs entwined, grass blades prickling the underside of her legs, her arms draped in a lazy embrace with Reed. It’d been mowed recently, and the green grassy smell tickled her nose. Traffic was humming around the perimeter of the park, and a few late night revellers were laughing. Reed’s body provided just enough heat to keep her from shivering in the cool night air, as they sat half upright against an apple tree. Her hair was being messed with, a drowsy flicker from Reed’s precise hands. She could drift off to sleep if she wanted to, but her subconscious was still toying with a problem that needed to be solved. 

“I wish we could see the stars. Too much light pollution,” Reed said. The soles of her bare feet touched the an empty bottle of prosecco, and two glasses lay sticky next to it. They were looking up at the firmament.

“Well, we have just seen them. The stars of the chamber music scene. And then there’s me.” 

Reed smiled into Stella’s neck. “Yeah, whose idea was that, my little star?”

“It was free.”

“Not good enough, Stella. Two months in, and you’re already phoning it in for date night.”

Stella craned her neck to look at Reed, to see if she was serious. “I thought it would be romantic, a classical concert in a park on an English summer night in June.” She pawed at Reed’s cheek.

“This is romantic. That was dull as hell.” 

“Alright, Ms Picky.” She turned her head back to look at the majestic dome of the skies. “You’re in charge for next week.” She let her mind wander to earlier times, times she’d felt so unbodied, so nearly carefree. “I wish I still smoked,” she faux-lamented. 

“I’m glad you quit,” Reed, the physician, said. She stopped her hair-mussing for a second to bend down and place a kiss above Stella’s eyebrow. She followed it up with a stroke of a finger to remove the waxy chapstick imprint she left behind.

Stella felt so taken care of, so whole. Reed knew how to love her well. How to anticipate her moods and the liminal space just before she’d start to sleep in so late at the weekends that it would be too late to go out and see anyone, or to swim, or to see her therapist, but Reed knew and could pull her back in time. Before the downwards spiral of distorted perspectives and impossible standards for herself. For Stella, it was easy to be generous with her, to show her the depths and the heights of that deep well of feeling inside of her for Reed. Easy to say to her what was on her mind. 

“Do you think I made the wrong decision, with Burns?” Stella asked, her voice low. 

“You know, I don’t. I know that it still bothers you, but anything less than total victory and a complete overhaul of HR functioning would have bothered you. I think you did what you could, and tried to help other women. Sometimes that’s all you can do.” Reed tried to find Stella’s eyes, to stop Stella’s self-doubt that surprised her sometimes. 

“I hated it. I hated it so much. Calling him up, groveling.” Stella’s voice was shot through with righteous indignation. 

“Yeah. It’s wrong, it shouldn’t be like this. It’s not fair. But here we are. Personally, I’m just glad he stuck to his word and withdrew his complaint when you withdrew yours,” Reed soothed, knowing Stella would never feel the same.

“I feel like I should have fought it.” The resolve she’d felt when she’d ripped open the letter informing her of the counter-complaint came bubbling back up again, and her hands formed clenched fists.

“But then what, my dear? He has enough influence in the PSNI and perhaps also in the Met to bend people’s ears and that would have been that. You would have, at the least, received a formal warning, and at the worst, been shoved into extraneous case files in a basement somewhere. Keep your eye on the bigger goal.” She resumed her playing with the ends of Stella’s hair. 

“I’ve thrown other women under the bus for the sake of my career.” Stella choked out the fear that she’d held in most tightly, that had gripped her in the night. “I’ve ensured he can go out and do it again, this time in the knowledge that it will go unpunished.”

“No, Stella. You’ve done the opposite. He’s heard the warning. And that’s more effective than the conclusion of the complaint would have been. The fear of possible punishment, instead of the punishment he would actually receive, which is, more than likely, very little if anything at all.” Reed was insistent now, the tone she used to use with recalcitrant and scared patients. “Sometimes the most feminist thing you can do is to take care of yourself. It takes many, many cases like yours and other influences to really change how it works on the inside. The policy, the internal procedure, it’s all gloss, when it comes to sexism. It’s all down to how individual people choose to enforce it. And that will take time, and steady pushback from people like you to percolate through. Stop giving yourself a hard time, my love. You did not create this mess. It isn’t solely yours to resurrect. You’re just one light among many.”

Stella’d been listening with quiet concentration. “And you are the sun, so bright and warm.”

“Ah, look who’s turned soppy in middle-age,” Reed said with eyes twinkling.

“You’re quite the speech giver yourself, there, dear. You should take over from Dear Sugar.” She nestled herself more snugly against Reed’s body heat.

“Perhaps when I tire of slicing open corpses every morning.”

“So, that’s a no, then?” Stella kissed her girlfriend. Some days she wakes up and needs to touch Reed to make sure she’s real, but tonight she’s certain of it. This invisible light is the realest thing she knows, and it’s as strong as Reed’s ‘no’ about sugar before bedtime to her girls. Their girls. 

END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with me to the end of my first fic! I started it to develop a consistent writing practice and it's been wonderful to read your comments. I've become a little bit addicted to those kudos emails. If you have any feedback or want to bring the discourse™ then you can find my email address when you click the link to the fandom trumps hate auction, which is about ten chapters back. I'm probably going to clean this up a bit in due time and re-arrange the chapters (if ao3 will let me) in a way that makes more sense. Love!


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